


I Believe In You and Me

by Daiako (Achrya)



Series: 12 days of naughty and nice [3]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gods & Goddesses, Christmas Adventures, First Kiss, Fluff, M/M, Sweet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-23
Updated: 2017-12-23
Packaged: 2019-02-19 05:43:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13117269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Achrya/pseuds/Daiako
Summary: Gods do things slowly. Age slowly, live slowly, love slowly. Mortals cram so much into their short lives and Noctis is amazed by it, wonders if there might be something to it all. Sneaking out with Ignis makes him think humans might be on to something.





	I Believe In You and Me

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sirentales](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sirentales/gifts).



> For sweaterpawnnoctis, on tumblr, set in my Gods and Goddess AU. Nothing but fluff here.

In the beginning there had been the nothing, the one great darkness from which all things came. And then there had been the Astrals, the Seven, born from the Nothing and from them came the world, the sky, the water, all the things that swam, flew, and crawled. The Gods. And for a time all have lived in harmony but then the first Betrayal had happened, when the Astral Ifrit betrayed his fellows, and so the Astrals came to the Gods and asked for their aid. 

Ifrit’s last act was the curse the world with a darkness that infected and warped all things, even the Gods. It was revenge for siding with the Astrals but when the Gods cried out ot the creators for aid only silence met them. 

And so the War of the Astrals began. The Gods, angry at being forced into the dispute of others, angry at having lost numbers. The world shook, split, froze and burned as the two sides raged, many died, and in the end it was the gods who stood victorious, the new lords of the world, and amongst them they divided the world amongst them, Regis to rule the Underworld, Cid the Lands, Sylva the Sky, Moon, and Sun, and Weskham the Sea.  

It was also during this war that the morals were created, bled out from a grievous wound suffered by the Astral Etro, breathed into life with her last breath. And the Gods, angry as they were, did still love their creators and so they loved the humans as well. 

Then came the second betrayer, the God King Ardyn, filled with the power of the remaining power of the Astrals, given to him for some purpose. (To strike against the other gods, keep them humble, was what many said including God of Death turned King Regis) Though all agreed Ardyn thought he was doing it to protect humans, who he loved more than any other and feared the wrath of the gods would come to, and had no idea that power of the Astrals was a trap, lying in wait. It mattered little the why, because in the end he became twisted, bitter, too strong to be contained by anything but the combined might the Gods. The fight nearly tore the world in two and, once it was done, the Gods quietly moved to the shadows, watching and helping but never revealing themselves. 

They faded from memory, forgotten, replaced, and those who had once been known agreed it was for the best. 

Mortals were strange creatures. Noctis knew all about them from his tutoring and had seen many at the moment of death as he came to collect their souls, but he didn't really understand them. There was, after all, more to them than death, wasn't there? More than the shocked denial of the young, the sad resignation of those who ‘should have seen it coming’, the panic of the not ready, and the content acceptance of the old and ill. More than last moments and taking his hand, more than the final carriage ride to the underworld, side by side in the Regalia. 

There was life. Whole lives lived in the blink of eye, families built, taken apart, children born, love found and lost, dreams realized, deferred, lost. It was fascinating and amazing and terrifying, in a way, to be part of all that and knowing that it was so short a time, so futile an effort, and yet they lived and they did so fully, wholly, with all they had. 

They made so much fit, did more things in seventy or eighty years than Gods would even dare contemplate let alone actually doing. He watched them in his scrying pool often, asked his mother and father who actually had once moved among them, visible and loved, all about them, absorbed the stories of the mortals they protected and guided, but it wasn’t enough. 

How could it be when there was just so much? 

So when Ignis came to him one night, actually climbed up the vines outside his window, dressed as mortals dress in slacks and a crisp button down shirt, hair soft and falling around his face and into his eyes, and asked him to sneak out to the mortal world he could resist agreeing. 

They’d snuck out before, when they were young curious godlings, to look down on the mortals or visit their beaches, jungles, forests, islands (all so different from the underworld Noctis has been confined to as a sickly godling) but with time had come age and responsibility. Ignis was more serious than the indulgent young god he’d been, but Noctis supposed it was only fitting the Sun God would be serious. And Noctis...well. 

Noctis was Death. And Death was a serious thing, and there was a shocking amount of legwork and paperwork involved in it. 

They didn’t see each other as often as they used to and certainly not for games or sneaking about. 

Ignis had clothes for him, dark jeans, a butter soft black sweater with sleeves long enough to cover his fingertips, a jacket, hat, and scarf. Unneeded, they couldn’t get cold being what they were, but Noctis found he felt...very warm, in them, a fluttering feeling in his stomach as Ignis wound the scarf around his face and neck then pulled the hat over his ears. He laughed and waved him off, reminding him that he was a fully grown god of nearly 2,200, not a godling who needed to be babied. 

But perhaps he just wanted to be able to turn away and hide his flushing face. 

They couldn’t take either of their chariots, his father would notice if Regalia was gone and Ignis wasn’t trying to raise the Sun, so they had to make the long trek of the Stairs of the Dead, to where the veil between worlds was thin and they could pass through to where they desired to be. 

Which was a city. A big, bustling city full of humans of all sizes, shapes, ages, and skin tones, rushing to and fro along the sidewalks. They stepped right out into the middle of the crowd and were immediately jostled around; a few people glared and others apologized but Noctis scarcely heard them. 

“They can see us!” He gasped as another errant shoulder slammed into him and nearly turned him completely around. Ignis’ laughter, warm and accented, rose above the chatter of the crowd and again there was that fluttering in his stomach. 

“They can. And hear us so watch what you say.” 

Noctis nodded, stumbling away from Ignis and grinning from ear to ear. He moved with the crowd to a degree, amazed at the fact people weren’t moving around him, didn’t part for him like water rushing around stones. No, they were there and warm and alive and staring at him with confusion in their eyes, no doubt unsure of what to make of a young man staring at them with wide eyed delight. 

He’d never been close like this! Sure, when he came to collect souls he took them by the hand, sometimes sat at their sides while the end came, trying to provide what comfort he could, but that wasn’t like this. These people were in their primes, brimming with life energy, going about their lives, and he was among them, real and-

“Come on.” Ignis called. “This way.” 

Noctis whipped around and, laughing apologies, pushed his way back to the sun god. They started down the sidewalk, close enough to each other that their arms brushed and, much against his will, Noctis found himself peeking up at the other. Ignis’ light was dimmed out here on the mortal plane, turned down for human eyes, but to Noctis he was still brighter than all around him. He was golden, skin gleaming, flecks of it in his eyes, highlights in his hair, and all around him the air shimmered with barely contained heat. 

They walked and walked, Noctis torn between watching Ignis and watching all the things around them. Shop windows made up with twinkling lights, fake snow painted on the glass, ribbons and garland and trees, cheerful displays that the mortals ohhed and ahhed about. He lingered over them too, pressing against the glass in glee. It was all so cheerful, the outward showing of mortal spirit. They didn’t really have yearly or even frequent celebrations in the godly plane, things like that became tedious after a few hundred years and the passing of time was slow and meaningless to them for the most part. 

Other than ceremonies when they got their titles, married, and gave birth there wasn’t much to celebrations. And the occasional orgy, if that was what one was into (Noctis wasn’t, but he was aware such things happened.) 

The sidewalk was decorated to, light poles circled with ribbon, dotted with fake greenery and berries, more twinkling lights that caught and sparkled off of dangling icicles. He turned this way and that, only kept moving along by occasional nudges from Ignis. 

“Mortals are so...they do so much.” Noctis breathed, smiling up at Ignis again. 

Ignis nodded, eyes darting around behind his glasses. “They do and-ah, here we were.” 

They rounded the corner in a big open area and Noctis stopped, breath leaving him in one excited rush. The area was circular, with a large ice pool in the middle that people were moving over, and full of trees. There was a large one, huge, decorated in pink and silver, lights, balls, ribbons, and more, in the center of the ice pool, and smaller ones lining the outside of it, also decorated in all sorts of colors and styles. There were people miling around the outside as well, visiting small food stalls, holding steaming cups and things wrapped in paper. 

Laughter and conversation brimming with happiness filled the clearing. Life filled the clearing, so strong it made his skin tingle as it rushed over him.  

“Oh.” 

“I thought you would like it.” Ignis sounded a bit smug and looked it too, lips tilting up into a smirk. “We need skates.” 

Noctis was a bit skeptical of strapping on boots with blades on the bottom but Ignis had never steered him wrong before so he did so, casting another glance at the ice pool as he did. There were families skating together, parents helping children, siblings pushing and shoving. Friends, gliding around, racing, laughing  as others teetered and clung to the edge, trying to coax them out. And couples, arm in arm and hand and hand, arms around backs and shoulders, heads tilted close. Walking away from the ice pool to sit, fingers tangled. 

Sharing drinks and bites of food, and kissed. 

“They are very...tactile and open, aren’t they?” Ignis said softly, pausing in doing up his laces. “Imagine meeting someone and being that close in days or weeks.” 

It wasn’t how they did things. Gods came to know each other slowly, grew up together for hundreds and thousands of years, worked for approval from heads of houses and the king before courting, courted for decades or centuries before deciding to tie their lives and houses together, had long engagements. It had to be that way, as marriage between them was no simple thing, full of magic and the blending of life force, meant to be everlasting. 

It was foolish to just rush in. 

Unless you were Noctis’ father, who had one day rode the Regalia into the Undying Forest of the House of Nature, scooped up his mother, the  Spring Goddess Aulea, and made off with her into the Underworld. That, Noctis understood, had been quite the scandal. 

And then there was Clarus, who had found love with a mortal woman, had two children, and then laid his human wife to rest all within forty years. A mere eyeblink for them, Gladio and Iris had barely been speaking and walking unaided when their mother passed on into the Underworld. Over 2000 years later and Clarus had never entertained another, and the House of Love had written many a poem about his heart ache. 

Prompto said he could see it in him, a darkness in his energy that would probably be there forever. 

It made sense to be cautious. They had so many years to find the right person after all and yet...yet.

“It looks nice doesn’t it?”

He felt Ignis jerk slightly, saw the older god turn to look at him, green and gold eyes blinking rapidly. Then he looked away, coughing into a gloved hand, and pushed himself up. He offered a hand to Noctis who took it, expecting to be pulled up to his feet and then released. 

When it didn’t happen, when Ignis twisted his hand so he was holding his, slotted their fingers together and used the connection to pull him closer, Noctis looked up in surprise. Ignis stared down at him, cheeks faintly pink but eyes resolute, intense; he leaned down, other hand coming up to cup his cheek and, oh, they were kissing. 

Noctis knew some couples were years between agreeing to court and even the most chaste of kisses (supposedly. He was, at times, skeptical of the truth of such things) and this was...this didn't feel chaste. It felt hot, blistering, Ignis' lips fitting against his own, sliding to fit just right, tongue running along the seam. Noctis pushed up into it clumsily, tried to follow Ignis' lead. They broke apart when they finally needed air, panting into each other's mouths. 

Ignis blinked then stepped away, clearing his throat. "Yes. Well. Mortals might be on to something after all." 

Noctis touched a gloved finger to his lips. "Maybe."


End file.
